As I grew up, I never really paid any attention to the color of lighting inside my house or outside of the house as long as the light came on when I flipped the light switch. I was interested in other things in life other than the color of the light being emitted.
I started working in the landscape lighting business before LED bulbs became the standard lighting mechanism that they are today. In landscape lighting, you basically had four different types of lighting and only one of the four was used in low voltage lighting, which was halogen bulbs. On the 120V side of things, there is High Pressure Sodium, Metal Halide and Mercury Vapor bulbs. All of these 120V lighting types require a ballast in order to work properly to help maintain the voltage current going to the light bulbs. The unique aspect of these three lighting types is that they all produce a different color when operating. The High Pressure Sodium produces the standard halogen look that we have grown up with, which is more on the yellow side of the color spectrum, the Metal Halide produces a more whiter color and the Mercury Vapor produces the greenish hue that you may have seen in some yards over the years.
LED lighting has been around for many years, but it did not really take off in the landscape lighting industry until over the last decade and it now rules the industry as it should. LED lighting is a much more energy efficient lighting product and produces a much crisper and cleaner lighting appearance. We all remember the small ‘red’ or ‘green’ indicator lights on our electronics as digital technology became more and more prominent especially when computers arrived on the scene. These were the first glimpse of non-white colored lighting that I can remember.
There is a product in the landscape lighting marketplace today that can produce any color. FX Luminaire has a low voltage lighting system called Luxor that is capable of dimming, zoning, and color lighting. It is a very sophisticated product and can produce up to 30,000 different colors. The customer can control it with an app on their phone, which makes it simple. The app takes a little bit of time to get used to it, but once you do, the possibilities at your fingertips are endless.
You can make each individual light its own color or group some together. You can introduce a ‘color wheel’, which will allow the lights to change colors every so often depending on what you select. You can dim the fixtures down in one area of your yard and have other areas at full brightness. It will also display whichever shade of white you want. Some people prefer the ‘whiter’ white, or cool white, and some people prefer the more ‘yellow’ white, or soft white. This system connects to your home network and can also integrate with Alexa so that you can control it with your voice as well.
Exo Design can install one of these systems and would love to do so. Please call for a free estimate!